Search - Tillie's Punctured Romance/Mabel's Married Life on DVD

No talking during the movie - PLEASE!

Daryl Stenhouse | LAUNCESTON, TAS Australia | 10/25/2001

(1 out of 5 stars)

"This is a LaserLight product, and they don't care. They don't care about silent movies, or they wouldn't have put out three short comedies that run too fast. Correcting the film speed is one of the most basic remastering processes, but they couldn't be bothered.The main feature is an old (1950's graphics) repackaging effort, with the same ham-fisted and intrusive sound effects as used in the short comedies. On top of that there is a (gasp of horror)...
a NARRATOR! He is from the 1950's,too. His endless pointing out of every action in the movie is an insult to my intelligence.
The LaserLight people obviously couldn't be bothered to remaster this film or record a new sound track.The LaserLight people also don't care about their customers. On the back cover of the DVD box they say this, "Digitally mastered from the best available sources, with a newly recorded music score for the highest quality possible". Fortunately, higher quality versions of these works are not only possible, but they already exist - so you don't need to buy this sloth-ridden turkey (now there's an image!)."

Not as bad as expected

Mark Pollock | Davis, CA United States | 12/26/2002

(2 out of 5 stars)

"First of all, this review is for the Laserlight dvd "Charlie Chaplin Marathon", which has different content from other dvds that this review may appear on.What we have is is three readily available Chaplin short films, and the feature "Tillie's Punctured Romance". The three short films, "The Immigrant", "The Rink", and "The Vagabond", are three of Chaplin's best from the Mutual Films period, 1916-1917. In this edition, the films are presented in copies from the Blackhawk collection, with the 1930's era Van Buren soundtracks added on. The picture quality is surprisingly good for a budget dvd, the soundtracks are as horrible as they have always been, and the films are not as restored as the copies on the Image "Chaplin Mutual Films" collection. This makes the dvd not a bad starting place for the Chaplin novice. However, the copy of "Tillie's Punctured Romance" is a horror, a very bad print, missing many shots and scenes, with a narrator droning endlessly on to try and make sense of this choppy film. It is an abomination, and it saddens me to think that people might be buying this instead of the Image dvd of the film. The Image dvd is fully restored, and looks and sounds a good as possible. The verdict - this disc may pass for someone who isn't that interested in Chaplin, but it is not for the discerning fan. There are many discs to recommend instead of it."

Terrible

James Horvath | South Bend, Indiana United States | 04/03/2000

(1 out of 5 stars)

"Avoid at all cost,This is one of the worst collections I have ever seen.It has lame music and annoying sound effects.Save your money and buy one of the Mutuals or Essanay collections"

First feature comedy

Daniel H. Hawkins | Fort Worth, TX USA | 05/09/2002

(4 out of 5 stars)

"The reviews on this page seem to be referring to two or three different editions of "Tillie's Punctured Romance." So let me start by saying that I'm reviewing the Image DVD version (which also contains the one-reeler "Mabel's Married Life" as a bonus feature) and not the Chaplin marathon which seems to be the recipient of the bad reviews here."Tillie's Punctured Romance" is an important film for a couple of reasons. It was the very first feature length comedy, providing film comedy an alternative to one- and two-reel shorts. It was also the last film with Charles Chaplin as merely an actor; he began directing all of his films after this.In addition to its importance, "Tillie's Punctured Romance" is still enjoyable to watch. The print on this DVD is a little rough in places, a few times switching from what appears to be a nice 35mm print to a seemingly worn out 16mm print and then back again within the same scene. But overall, this is a quality presentation of the film when you consider the fact that it was made in 1914."